For wiki to 'go viral', what will the 'killer plugin' be?
Will it be content? A topic or issue of universal excitement, in which everyone feels they must contribute? Absolutely not.
Attracting **readers** is not what wiki is for. And specialisation of writing - podding - seems to be deep in the grain of wiki? So, not viral content.
Viral plugins then? Wonderful plugins. Or perhaps **configured plugins** - Graphviz map formats, spreadsheet-like lineup-processing functions, scraping and analytic functions.
If wiki can display a wonderful reptoire of tools for custom-handling the content of 'this' wiki - and bringing custom arrays of 'out-there' domesticated feed into the lineup - isn't THAT what will make (enough) folks excited, to make wiki become vernacular, and to create a new generation of wiki writer-sharers?
This is the 'commonplace book' and the lab notebook, brought into the 21st century? Coupled with the blog and other social media? But among communities of people 'seriously' engaged with how the world **actually** is, and actually might be engaged with and **remade**. Commonplace book - Evolving personal vision
Thus, not 'viral', but ubiquitous, vernacular. **Used**. Put-to-work. A basic medium of commons capability.
# Super-user, not plugin A later thought here was - not 'killer plugin', but a 'superuser' in a user community, who really knows their way round the wiki toolset, configuring local pages (aka 'tools') that really do the jobs that the community needs them to do. Then they 'just use it'.
The challenge then becomes, not a tech one (new plugins) but an org/social one: how to support the meta-community of superusers in serving their communities?
This could be a good way forward for a wiki-hosting platform: focus on a more limited userbase of more highly skilled wiki writers. Support them with documentation (ie wikis) for their use, and secondarily, for them to use with their 'vernacular users'. Superusers' documentation would include both text descriptions and plugin demos (eg graph tools).
'Superuser' isn't necessarily a great tag. Any alternatives? How about 'convener' - a nice community role. Or 'facilitator'? Right now, we'll go for Facilitator.